Chuck’s World

Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.
So, that’s what they decided to do.

The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve. “Since you are all such good customers,” he said, “I’m going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20.” Drinks for the ten now cost just $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men – the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his ‘fair share?’ They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody’s share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man’s bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay. And so:

The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).
The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.

“I only got a dollar out of the $20,” declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man,” but he got $10!”

“Yeah, that’s right,” exclaimed the fifth man. “I only saved a dollar, too. It’s unfair that he got ten times more than I!”

“That’s true!” shouted the seventh man. “Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!”

“Wait a minute,” yelled the first four men in unison. “We didn’t get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!”

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn’t show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn’t have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

10. “They told me at the blood bank this might happen.”

9. “This is just a 15 minute power-nap like they raved about in that time management course you sent me to.”

8. “Whew! Guess I left the top off the White-Out. You probably got here just in time!”

7. “I wasn’t sleeping! I was meditating on the mission statement and envisioning a new paradigm.”

6. “I was testing my keyboard for drool resistance.”

5. “I was doing a highly specific Yoga exercise to relieve work-related
stress. Are you discriminatory toward people who practice Yoga?”

4. “Why did you interrupt me? I had almost figured out a solution to our biggest problem.”

3. “The coffee machine is broken…”

2. “Someone must’ve put decaf in the wrong pot…”

And the #1 best thing to say if you get caught sleeping at your desk…

1. ” … in Jesus’ name. Amen.”

• Brittany scores a superior rating, playing the piano, at the Bach Music Festival.
• Hunter’s team wins their first soccer game 3-1.
• The girls go to the Hannah Montana movie. Brittany and her friend Anna have a great time!
• Hunter’s team wins their second soccer game 7-0. Wow!
• The kids just left for “Saturday Night Live” at the church.

Now that was a big day!

I read this blog post and it really touched me. There are so many times in life where we should just learn to keep our mouths shut. I know I have had my share of “open mouth insert foot” moments. I just hope I never blunder this badly.

Before I became pregnant, I wondered aloud about what my child would be like. Would she have my curls, my poor arithmatic skills, my sunburn prone skin? Would I stay at home, or work outside? Would we live in the city? The ‘burbs? And what about names, which sounded good with my last one? There was endless opportunity to opine. But the person I would yammer to for hours about this, was not my husband, but my friend Emily, who would yammer right back without breaking to breathe. Both of us newly married, not pregnant, not even close. But since the moment we met, we have not stopped talking, and motherhood was our favorite topic of all.

So after I gave birth to my daughter Chloe, Emily was the first friend to hold her, right there in the hospital where she had all but broken down the door with excitement. She did not know then that she was just barely pregnant with her own daughter Rowan, who would enter the world nine months later, a spitting image of her handsome dad. Emily and I were overjoyed — finally, the daughters we had dreamed of many years ago, whose lives we planned over Chinese noodle soups at our office lunch hour.

Two weeks after Rowan was born, a pink flush appeared over one of her eyes. “It’s nothing,” I said, as did her pediatrian, who after some coaxing referred her to a dermatologist. I was sure Emily would call to tell me that it was a particularly bad case of baby acne. “This is more than we thought,” Emily left in a message for me. “We need to see a neurologist.”

Fast forward several weeks of doctors appointments and subway shlepping Rowan had a diagnosis: the seemingly benign rosiness on her face was a birthmark called a hemangioma. In rare instances and because the birthmark affected a major organ (eye), there was the possibility of neurological involvement. After a terrifying MRI where Rowan experienced an almost lethal reaction to the anesthesia and consults from vascular specialists and othalmologists, the news was good. Aside from the cosmetic implications as the hemangioma grew at lightening speed, the birthmark was superficial. This type of Hemagioma primarily regresses on its own, but since that can take years, Emily and her husband chose to assist the process with laser treatments.

You would think that the hardest part of their journey would end here – after a terrifying foray into new parenthood, dealing with heaps of doctors bills and ongoing laser treatments that would do wonders but were painful and temporarily traumatic for all involved. But alas, the true pain set in when Emily, whose resiliency and bravery was a sight to behold, attempted to go about her baby business on the streets of Manhattan. It was only then that she would really be tested.

Having a baby in the city is considered easy. You can go as far as your souped-up Bugaboo will take you. The Upper East Side, where Emily and I both live, is known to be particularly embracing of parents, offering limitless kids stores, the broad expanse of Central Park and about a million playgrounds. And Emily was poised to enjoy them all, despite the suprising path that her life as a new mommy had taken. Yet somehow, every day, there was at least one person (and usually many more than one) who would stop Emily in her tracks, peering at the lovely Rowan who was blissfully unaware of anything beyond the leaves above. “What’s wrong with your baby?” “What happened?” “Did you hit your baby?” “What is that?” “Did you drop her?”…everyone had a question. And many of them were expressed with an accusatory tone. Emily would be harassed in stores, at parks, in parking garages…anywhere you could imagine, someone was leaning into her stroller with an annoying and often offensive comment. Even the innocent onlookers (the man in the far too tight elevator at the 92nd Street Y who offered to share his own birthmarks) had something to say. And for a mom who dealt with the reality of having a child with a condition that required ongoing intervention, all Emily wanted was a normal experience outside the laser appointments, the eye patch, the steroid creams and her own little voice of worry.

Adults often condemn children for having no verbal filter. But time and time again, while children approached Rowan without a twinge of fear or hesitation, adults felt the need to stop and question. Sometimes, Emily tried to answer civilly and helpfully, offering a brief explanation. Other times, when she just wanted to blend in and enjoy the Great Lawn or a great cup of coffee, she lacked the energy to be cheerfully conversational.

As Rowan blossomed and the birthmark shrank, the questions continued. Suddenly, living in Manhattan was a unique liability. Where the streets are wide open and our children are not concealed in carseats behind windows of a suburban minivan, there is alot more exposure. Only now, Rowan was being exposed to questions about something that she had never herself thought to question. We worried about the day that she would ask Emily what all the fuss was about (and thankfully, 20 months later this extraordinary chatterbox has yet to ask).

Emily considers herself lucky. Her daughter was born with a temporary problem, one that now is barely perceptible. The real disfigurement is that on the face of a society that in this experience seemed to lack a common sensitivity to the emotion surrounding any visable difference. As we make every effort to teach our children tolerance, respect and manners, are we really modeling these same behaviors? Whether it be common curiosity or something more sinister, I can not help but disagree with the adage that the only dumb question is the one unasked.